Witch's Favour
by Tabitha Dornoc
Summary: [Oneshot, KH2] In the pretend Twilight Town, Roxas has no memory of Axel. Namine stole them all when she placed him there, but she, unfortunately, owes Axel a favour. AxelRoxas, if you squint.


**Disclaimer:** Ya know.

**Warnings: **Set in amongst the Six Days of Roxas, so spoiler friendly throughout there. No evidence at all that this could possibly be canon, but it doesn't contradict it. Those that _want_ there to be Axel/Roxas undertones will find it, but if it's not your cup, I wouldn't overly worry.

**Witch's Favour**

"I want a favour, little witch."

She doesn't quite jump in her skin, but her surprise is visible in the smudge her crayon makes across page. He's never been particularly good at stealth, compared to his fellow companions, but it's simple to sneak upon a child who believes she is alone. Simple to open Darkness before him and walk through to her world of constructed white. And this certain child has always been sadly afraid of everything, yet been far too fearless.

He pauses, tilting his head, to listen for the quick run of booted feet; to listen for the approach of the black or red cloaked men that live in her mansion. There is nothing. Perhaps they are too concerned with fixing their little town, and fixing whatever loophole he had found to slip into it. He allows himself a smirk. They won't find it.

"I want him back," he continues, once he's sure enough that they are alone. There is only one 'him', and she doesn't pretend to misunderstand him.

"He's not mine to give," she murmurs in her translucent voice, fluttery and infinitely pale. "Or yours to take." Bolder. He tries not to appreciate it.

"You owe me." She doesn't flinch like most creatures do at the thought of being in debt. He had lent her courage once, not so long ago. Lent her courage to step away from Marluxia's razor-sharp hold and gaze. He gave her freedom then. Look how she spent it.

In a painful white room, pictures tacked and sprawled, working under a madman. She'd jumped from one master to another. The only thing that really changed was the lack of a personified caged doll.

"What is it you want?" she asks him, and she's not nearly as broken as she'd like to be.

"A memory," he replies. She looks up at him with her eyes, not her face, so he can only see a sliver of colour under hooded lids. Witch, indeed.

"I... I don't have any to spare." He studies her for a moment to tell whether she is playing with him. Then he remembers that the only play this girl has ever known is the make-belief games she threw into the keyblade-wielder's mind so many months ago.

"I don't want one of yours. I want one of _his_," he says, quietly, lips straining to not smirk. Her hand pauses from its seemingly mindless doodle, and she raises her face fully to watch him. It's like being thrown to a wall and pinned powerless, as One through Six had done in their human days to each other. Strapped and tortured into giving up a heart and becoming something less.

If his heart hung in his chest in this half-life, he's quite sure it would have skipped a beat. Stars, this girl gave him chills.

"Sora?" the name is spoken like it's ambrosia on her lips, and he wonders (not for the first time) just what she gave up, truly, when she made that boy sleep.

But it's not one of Sora's memories he wants. It's one of his counterpart's; one of his shadow's, his nobody's. Roxas'. He won't say the name, he won't risk sounding like she just did, like a dying thing pining for the one being that gave it life.

Even so, her eyes fall in a viscous blink, and it occurs to him that the more expressionless her face, the more her mind is whirling in scary witch child fashion. Waiting, he folds his arms and collapses against the doorframe.

"Oh," is all she says for a minute. There is enough of a pause, and a discomfort of confusion in her twisted jaw that he allows himself to elaborate.

"I want you to give a memory back." That does it. As if a butterfly casually fluttered its wingspan across her face, understanding unfolds. One of Roxas' memories, returned to its rightful owner. One of the memories she stole when they had thrown him into that illusioned town of twilight. One she had taken, jarred, and stored in the deepest cold cellar.

"Of you?" she makes sure, fiddling with two crayons in her hand. Pulling a face, he nods. She smiles a little, rolling her Red and Black between finger and thumb. The Black snaps in two. "I can't."

His chakrams spring to his fingertips unconsciously, fire traveling through his veins to dance along metal. "You _owe_ me." The look she sends extinguishes the flames in his palms.

"I'd have to rebuild them all. There's no time." The broken Black crayon hangs together only by its outside paper cover. Frowning, she rips it entirely apart, then fits it back together carefully. "Unless... you give me one of yours," she whispers to herself, but stretches her arm to him, broken wax in hand.

"Excuse me?" Her answer is a solid stare. Leaving his languid post, he walks to the long white table and kneels across from her. "I give you one, and you... pass it on?" The twitch in her lips says he has the right of it, and with mock casualness slides her sketchbook towards him. Her sweet white fingers tangle with his gloved, fitting the Black in his poised fingers, broken-side down. Crayon meets paper.

His hand rests on the book, holding the crayon, but her own is curved around his. Like a mother guiding a child through his first steps, she navigates his clasping fingers. Smooth long strokes, staccato dashes, and violent smears. He doesn't dare (though he can't say why) look down at what her fingers, through his, are drawing. The colour is in his hand, but she is still the artist.

Her eyes never leave his face, and he does his best to avoid hers. When her sharp grip finally loosens, she pushes his hand away and folds the paper with sure, quick lines. His fingers tingle a little, but he doesn't feel any different. He shakes his head slightly, experimenting, but nothing feels dislodged.

"I'll give it to him tonight, in dream," as she waves the small folded page. She hadn't looked at it, and neither had he. If he squints, he can see the imprint of colour through the folds, but it would be impossible to make out any sort of recognizable shape.

"That's the memory? Which one?" Because he can't remember. She looks at him _sadly_, and he clenches his teeth so no fire bursts around her. Pity is something he will never abide.

"For you, it's gone," she says, still in sorrow, and as a quiet chill creeps along the inside of his bones he understands. Not a borrowed memory or a copied one. Given. He tries to think through all his time with Roxas and find the gaping hole where an experience should be, but his mind feels seamless. He's not as subtle when he shakes his head this time, but it still feels so whole. She's watching him, as she always always does, but its a tired concern on her face.

"Is... is it a good one?" is all he can let himself ask, avoiding her worry like young boys avoid girl's affections, slight blush included. But the imp in her smile, at his question, turns his chill to bitter ice, and his hands itch to rip the paper from her grasp and regain that sketched memory.

He doesn't, of course. When night imposes on day, and Roxas closes his eyes, he'll dream the memory. Because she promised, and he imagines she's gotten quite good at this. Then, Roxas will have a different memory of him, not just as a fire bearing madman that can stop Time and interrupt his simulated life.

So the next time he sneaks into that pretend twilight, he'll ask Roxas again to come back with him. And if Roxas dreams that memory, maybe it will unlock the rest. Or maybe it'll be enough to spark a curiousity in him to follow. He just wants a little leverage to entice Roxas, and maybe this will do.

On his way out of her pale prison he nods to her, saluting casually. And if he thought any of this would actually work, he would bother to say Thank You.


End file.
